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My Daily Journal


Spoon

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Alright, this is Day 0 of my Daily Journal because I did log into a game for a few minutes, but I caught myself and managed to stop and log off, so I'm hoping that will be the last time for the next 90 days. As of right now I'm not too sure what I should expect yet, but I am hoping this is going to be what I need to move forward. I met with Morgan Smith this morning as he and I attend the same college, and we had a very good discussion involving what to expect with this program, things I should look into for replacing games in my life, and useful tools for keeping myself away from relapsing. I downloaded and installed ColdTurkey, which will be a good tool for reminding me that I am stopping games, as well as most other forms of social media and virtual distractions. As of the time I'm writing this, I've hit Checkpoint 4 in Respawn. While I still haven't decided what I want to do to fill my time when I would normally be gaming, for now I'm considering making music, but I will need to make sure that doesn't end up causing the same issues gaming does, and I know I'll need to find other activities. As suggested, I signed up for headspace, and have done my first meditation.

Here are my 10 things I'm grateful for today:

  • I'm Grateful that I have a mentor I can talk to who has used Game Quitters
  • I'm Grateful that I'm going to the college of my dreams learning what I love to do
  • and I'm also Grateful for my college's administration having the thoughtfulness to step in and see how I'm doing when I was slipping
  • I'm Grateful for my awesome apartment
  • I'm really grateful for ColdTurkey
  • I'm Grateful for the Game Quitters series and community 
  • I'm Grateful for my laptop (which also happens to be a result of my gaming addiction)
  • I'm grateful for my car
  • I'm Grateful for sleeping pills
  • I'm Grateful for music

Since this is being written in the middle of the day, Here are some Goals I hope to get done before tonight:

  • Start reading a book
  • Go to the Gym and work out
  • Clean my Apartment a bit

I will add a reply before I go to bed tonight containing what I managed to accomplish.

EDIT: I fell asleep before I could add my reply, and unfortunately I managed to get none of those done.

Edited by Spoon
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1 hour ago, Cam Adair said:

Awesome to have you with us. Big fan of your school. :) 

Thanks! It's my dream school, but like I said in my introduce me page, because it's a Computer Science focused school gaming is integral to the culture, making quitting that much more difficult.

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Day Two:

Almost caved in today, but I guess that was to be expected. Instead of playing games, I managed to install and setup Arch Linux on my old laptop without using an installer, so I'm really proud of that since it's something I've been wanting to learn and do. One of the perks of using Linux is it has almost zero support for games, and the few options out there are buggy as heck, so that's something beneficial for me. I accidentally let my nap turn into full-blown sleeping, so I just woke up :/... I took a sleeping pill so hopefully that will help me get back on a normal circadian rhythm.

Edit: I was not able to fall back asleep, but I dragged myself to campus, so I'll be here for the rest of day 3. :S

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Day Three:

I've been up since about midnight last night, but it's been a surprisingly productive day. Normally after days like these I'd want to sit down and play games, but right now I'm just eating dinner and watching an episode of a show on netflix. Normally just watching the show wouldn't be enough, but I don't know if it's because I'm tired or if stepping away from gaming has helped quiet my mind a bit... I'd like to think it's the latter, but I know it's way too early for that to be the case. Tomorrow I have the day off, so I'll have to find something to fill my day. I'll probably do some catch-up work for the classes I fell behind in due to the gaming. I will have to do that somewhere outside my apartment since A) it's a complete mess and B) I'm afraid I'll slip back into my old habits if I stay. But that's all about tomorrow. Not much else happened today... two of my classes ended, so that will take off a lot of the stress from my somewhat heavy workload, but it also removes half my schedule, so now my classes are from 10-11 then 330-420, so those gaps have me worried the most... I'll need to find something productive to do.

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Day 4:

Grades just came in for the two classes that ended yesterday... I passed one, failed the other. On the positive side, the class I did fail was not a required class for my degree, so at least that's something to be thankful for. Since today was my day off, I did manage to get some assignments in my other classes done early, including a Literary Analysis for English. I decided to write about Westworld since it's currently my favorite TV show, and I know a lot of people didn't rewatch the series a second time, missing the deeper story. I did spend more of the day than I would have liked to watching YouTube videos, but all in all, it's been a productive day... certainly more productive than it would have been if I had just played games.Since the two classes I have left are at 10-11 and 330-420, respectively, I will need to find something to do in the middle of the day that's more productive than coming back to my apartment and watching tv... If I remember, I'll try to go to the gym and start working out.

EDIT: I guess I forgot to push submit last night

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Forgot to write up Day 5:
Not much happened... I've got a speech coming up in Spoken Comm. that I'm going to shamelessly use the stuff I wrote in my English Paper about Westworld as the content, killing two birds with one show.

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Day 6:

Of course the day I decided to actually get my stats homework done before class is the day my teacher doesn't ask for it. I should explain a bit: He doesn't ever really ask us to turn it in, but instead, he'll have Daily Problems that are usually from the previous night's homework, and usually, I do them in class (much like half the class). But last night I had enough time to get it finished, but today instead of doing the daily problem, he just decided to give everybody a free grade. I suppose I shouldn't be complaining because a) I got a free 100 and b) I should be doing the homework every day regardless, but it does kinda feel like the work I did put in last night was all for naught. ANYWAYS, I've found how I want to start my Spoken Communications speech about Westworld; there's a scene in the first episode where a robot is malfunctioning and starts quoting Shakespeare, and it's the scene that actually got me to start watching the show in the first place, so I'll start with that scene, then lead into my speech. I've also texted my parents to see if they can recommend a good exercise routine since I now have a massive gap in my day and a nice gym in my apartment complex. Hopefully, that will not only give me something to do during the day, but it will also help me lose some weight I've gained over the years.

EDIT: I could swear I posted this last night, but apparently I didn't.

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Day 8:

Again, I keep forgetting to post these, but I'm working on getting caught up. Yesterday was a really slow day... not much happened. I started learning guitar again, hopefully that will keep me occupied whenever I'm bored.

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Day 9:

Finally back on track with the posting! Today was a productive one. A friend of mine asked me to help him work on a personal project he was making a while ago and I finally found a solution to the problem he had, and even managed to get the whole thing coded! The only concern I have is that this project is a game, but since I'll be coding it, I don't think it will be too much of an issue. Other than that, I did break out my guitar again and started re-learning how to play... not the easiest thing to do since my fingers won't do what my mind wants them to, but I guess that's part of the process. I don't have spoken communication tomorrow, so at least I'll have another day to prepare for my speech. I'm a little bit bummed out right now cause earlier today when I was getting lunch, on the way home I ran over a nail, which is currently embedded in my rear passenger tire... Luckily I don't seem to be losing air pressure, or if I am it's at an insignificant rate since it's been 8 hours and my tire is still pretty much the same. One of the downsides of living in Salt Lake is literally everything is closed on Sundays. So that means even if I was losing air pressure, I'd have to drop my car off at the tire repair place and walk home, just to come back the next day. Thank God that isn't the case though, cause that would really have made me upset.

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On 2/12/2018 at 2:14 PM, Cam Adair said:

Set a reminder on your phone to post your journal. That way you won't "forget". :)

Good job btw! Small wins create major progress over time.

I will absolutely do that, thanks for the suggestion!
Anyways, I haven't relapsed, but these last few days have been quite hectic, so I apologize for not updating the Daily Journal. 

Day 12:
I managed to finish one of my late english papers yesterday and got it turned in, and right now I'm about to go work on this week's assignment (which is due roughly in 5 hours, but has a loose deadline). I've also recently started picking up the guitar and learning how to play, so one of the things I've used to motivate myself to get all the overdue work is whenever I have them all turned it I will reward myself with a better guitar. Anyways I'm going to keep this post short since I need to get back to working on my assignments. I also just set up my reminder so hopefully I won't go AWOL again.

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Day 13:

So in my stats class, we did the project-exam's data gathering in class, which is normally assigned over the weekend, and I managed to get that done today. My spoken comm speech is tomorrow and I feel pretty confident that I will do well. Unfortunately, last night while I was working on the stats homework that was due today, I ended up not having enough time to do the online workshop (think group discussion and review/revision), so I'm hoping that I can still turn it in tonight partial credit. Even when I did sit down and try to come up with an idea for my paper I just kept drawing blanks. Hopefully things go better tonight.

Edited by Spoon
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Day 14:

Did my speech today, but the speakers in the room were broken so my video didn't have the impact I wanted. Other than that I felt it went pretty good. I'm planning on going to see Black Panther tonight if the theaters near me have tickets available. Honestly I can't really think of much else to write since I didn't have stats today and I slept in...

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Dat 15:

So I met up with a buddy of mine and we watched Black Panther last night, it was alright. So far today has been a slow day. Slept in late, and haven't really done anything productive, but also haven't been playing games.

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Day 16: 

Today was also a slow day. I'm having nonstop writer's block for my overdue english assignments, so I've been working on my stats project instead, but it's been kinda dull. I did also start watching a new show to pass the time. I'm still waiting to hear back from my PT to get my workout plan so I can start hitting the gym (since I know literally nothing about how to work out ). Hopefully he gets that to me soon. Also there's been a winter storm that blew in at noon today... supposed to get around a foot of snow so that's gonna be fun sorting out tomorrow morning.

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10 hours ago, Spoon said:

Day 16: 

Today was also a slow day. I'm having nonstop writer's block for my overdue english assignments

Hey :) In my experience the best way to go past a writer’s block is to just start writing something (related), even if you know that it’s not 100% correct or 100% what you were trying to say it will help you building momentum. For example you can start writing something like “I’m finding it difficult to write about X, because Y Z K; Y is the main problem, because...”. It will help you to get started & at the same time it will let you see clearly why you’re stuck :)

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Day  23:

Well, Washington's Birthday means I had no school today, and the winter storm that rolled in last night made going out awful. All wasn't for naught though, I did manage to get some work done on my late English papers. Not a whole lot, but it's like eating an elephant; one bite at a time right? Since I've already done my stats project since it was done in class and there's nothing going on in Spoken Comm, I'm kinda finding myself a bit bored tonight... maybe I'll open up the software I was using to teach myself guitar, but I know I'll have to be very careful to make sure it doesn't become another addiction.

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Dunno why I said 23 when it was 17... also I could have sworn I posted yesterday, cause I remember writing it before I did my stats homework. 

Welp: Day 18: 

Had a pretty successful day. Spoken Comm is just going to be one final project two weeks from now, and that gives me plenty of time to work more on my catch up work. Stats has gotten pretty time consuming now; our homework is only 2 questions but each question takes about 35mins to complete. 

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Day 19:

Today was an easy day. I still have my statistics homework and English assignments to do, but there's a lot less pressure right now, and since my workload is pretty light I'll be able to get more late work done. Right now I'm working on the "prospectus" for a research paper (which is the final assignment in english), which luckily is a small assignment that I can tackle pretty quickly. Unfortunately, my statistics homework is more of the same from last night, meaning 2 problems each taking up about 35mins.

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Day 20:

Ever since my speech in spoken comm, my days have been really easy. This week's stats project is actually surprisingly fun; we just have to go out and find a research paper then analyze their methodology and results... and I got my English prospectus done and turned in on time (decided to write about implementing an autobahn system in the US Interstates). Since there's no grammar assignment nor discussion in English this week, I'm also getting caught up on the older work, which is something I've sorta just been taking baby steps on so I don't fall behind with current work.

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